The ongoing indigenisation drive in the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) was in focus on Tuesday when Defence Minister Rajnath Singh launched the 41st meeting of the ICG top brass. Singh also stressed the government’s vision of peptides in modernizing the Coast Guard as well as the Indian armed forces through indigenization through the use of locally manufactured military equipment. He said that the ICG is to lose substantially on this front, as 31 ships are being built by Indian shipyards under projects with a value of over ₹ 4000 crore.
Speaking on the occasion, Singh discussed different steps being taken to improve ‘Aatmanirbharta’ in the defence products production domain. In this context, he outlined the capital approved by the Defence Acquisition Council, the apex Indian procurement agency meant to enhance the capacities of the Coast Guard. Among the newly procured equipment are Multi-Mission Maritime aircraft, software-defined radios, interceptor boats, Dornier aircraft, and next-generation fast patrol vessels.
“In today’s world, where AI, quantum computing, and drone systems are dominating advanced technologies, security threats are also rapidly changing,” Singh said. He stated that due to the existing global political environment, there is likely going to be an increase in threats at sea in the future. We have to be ready and on the lookout for these things. The usefulness of skilled staff cannot be overemphasized; however, a potential future vision would be to be the technological Coast Guard,” he said.
The three-day conference provides a useful forum for ICG commanders to have targeted discussions about strategic, operated, and logistical issues, primarily regarding current political international and piracy threats. Singh said that ICG described it as the country’s main protector of its long coastline, whereby it is tasked with constant surveillance of the exclusive economic zone and the fight against terrorism as well as trafficking in arms, drugs and humans.
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